Nowadays, a data center in which a plurality of racks on which respective electronic apparatuses such as servers, network equipment and the like are stacked are disposed is widely used. In a data center of the above mentioned type, an air conditioning system that blows off cooled air from air conditioners to cool the electronic apparatuses in order to bring down heat generated from the electronic apparatuses is utilized.
However, in the case that a fault has occurred in one air conditioner in a data center of the above mentioned type, in some cases, the fault-occurred air conditioner (the air conditioner in which the fault has occurred) may not blow off the cooled air to electronic apparatuses which have been cooled using the fault-occurred air conditioner so far. The temperature of each of the electronic apparatuses concerned may be increased and hence a malfunction may generate.
Therefore, as a technique for cooling electronic apparatuses which have been cooled using a fault-occurred air conditioner so far, a technique for setting a cooling capability of an air conditioner which works normally to an upper limit to cool the electronic apparatuses in place of the fault-occurred air conditioner is proposed. Specifically, in the case that a fault has occurred in one air conditioner, the flow rate at which a normally working air conditioner (an air conditioner which is working normally) blows off cooled air is set to a maximum value and the cooled air is supplied to the electronic apparatuses which have been cooled using the fault-occurred air conditioner so far.
However, in the above mentioned technique for cooling the electronic apparatuses using another air conditioner in the case that the fault has occurred in one air conditioner, the flow rate at which the normally working air conditioner blows off the cooled air is set to a maximum value out of consideration of a flow rate which is appropriate to cool the electronic apparatuses which have been cooled using the fault-occurred air conditioner so far.
As a result, the cooled air may be supplied to the electronic apparatuses which have been cooled using the fault-occurred air conditioner so far at an air flow rate which is higher than would be appropriate to cool the electronic apparatuses concerned and hence the whole inside of a data center may be cooled excessively. Therefore, such a problem may generate that in the case that a fault has occurred in one air conditioner, the power consumption of each of other normally working air conditioners is increased and hence effective cooling of the electronic apparatuses is not allowed accordingly.
The followings are reference documents.
[Patent Document 1] Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2006-118837
[Patent Document 2] Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2007-328633